wizardseason | Wizard's House

Wizard's House

"Hey"

The Wizard greets the evil-allured knights the same way every night, with the same word, while casually sitting on the steps of the porch outside of her little home. The building looks handmade, like it was built by people who cared about the place they were going to live. Surrounding it on all sides are fields as far as the eye can see. Vegetables of all kinds, with fruit trees and bushes placed throughout the landscape. Closer to the home are bigger trees, willows and others, providing shade from the strange three suns above. Wherever this is, it isn't the world that the knights know.

Plunged into the ground a mere few feet away from the steps leading up to the home is a handwritten sign that states the following:

Knight Rules:
- Tell others if you want
- You can't reveal others
- The world ends this year

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"Okay."

He says it like he understands, but he doesn't really. Suddenly he's wishing he'd kept up with all this wizard death shit. The Protector was the one who picked the Princess, right?

"Why doesn't he want you have four?"

Gyre's got the basics of the protector down, that was something. She'd educate him if he wanted, and if he asked.

"He doesn't want to die, and he doesn't want the world destroyed." She answers like it's the simplest thing in the world.

He feels incredibly stupid for just a moment. Of course the dude who fashions himself The Protector wouldn't want the world to die. At least it gives him an easy path back to the other threads.

"Can he stop it by himself? You said the world would end no matter what, right?“

"He can't do it alone. So long as I'm defeated, it spins on."

Her answer fits what's been said about this yearly business. The knights and princess have to fight. The Wizard has to be defeated. The world has to be saved. It all lines up with that narrative.

That is... a lot to take in. His eyes widen, and then widen again. Now is the first time he's actually mad since he woke up here, an absolutely furious snarl in his throat all of a sudden. Sure, the snarl hurts around his scar but fuck, the implication in her statement is so fucking ugly.

"He's making this happen? Why, because he's scared to die?"

Ah, Gyre's one of the few to pick up on a bigger, bleaker picture. She hadn't even given him the details, she'd let him reach the conclusion. He wasn't the first knight to realize it, but if the Protector ever caught wind that he'd learned of it he'd be dead for real.

It's a shame she wasn't going to tell him just how bad it was yet. He just needed the minimum amount to stay alive.

"Don't trust what he says." She dodges the question, she could explain his reasons but that was always the whinny that sounded better from the horse's own mouth.

"He won't let it end."

He's mad! Wow, he thought if he was going to be mad at anyone, it'd be the wizard. So many people hate her so much, and he can't help glancing towards Garrot at the thought, wondering how that was going.

He's still here though, in the moment with her, and he can't help but hit the tree above her hat after another second of thought. If the world is still here because some little coward wants other people to die so he can live, that is inexcusable. But he also knows she's the wizard, and while he's pretty sure she's not lying, he can't be certain. She hides herself well.

"How do I talk to him myself?"

She hides herself well both under a hat, and in her life. She's had over forty years of practice on this issue, and with her life experiences added on top... Well, she's likely around Gyre's age, if not older, there's no telling what she's learned in that time. Whether she's being honest or lying here, she's at least talking.

But she's telling the truth, so hopefully he's listening.

"Ask the Princess."

"Mm." Okay, he absolutely will do that. Then there's another familiar silence as he tries to find his threads again, though this time he's also breathing deeply. He needs to calm down. Being angry at a guy he can't talk to yet is worthless.

"Why do you keep coming back if you want all this to stop?"

Gyre will feel a weight in his hand as the Wizard summons forth a stick of jerky into it, she'd spied enough to get a feeling for what he might eat. She can't tempt him with the coffee she's taking a sip of, here.

"I don't get a choice not to."

He looks at his hand the second he feels it, eyes widening a little at the jerky. He really prefers it fresh to cured. Jerky is usually too salty, but in this moment he doesn't care. He sighs deeply, and slides down the tree to sit beside her, picking the jerky apart, taking tiny bites of it.

This is a long silence as he tries to process the pure rage in him at the idea that she, or anyone, is forced to do a thing like this. Or well... she said she was forced to come back, not that...

"Is it your choice to play this game? In this way?"

Whatever face she might, or might not, be making in response to his question is obscured by her hat as she answers him. Her voice doesn't betray any emotions, though, so it's just a single muffled word.

"No."

He nods, and again he's quiet. Processing her words. Processing the world view that she's laid in his lap. It seems miserable, and everything in him is screaming for him to help her. To make this stop. He knows better then most that forcing something to live past its death is never good.

"You said you tried to save this world, right? How?" he murmurs, touching the grass beside her so she can hopefully see despite her hat in the way. He means this place rather then his world. He wants to know that story.

She can see him anyway, her hat doesn't obscure her own view. She's never in a position where she could just be killed freely by those around her and this is no exception. Though she'd already ranked Gyre closer to the top of the favorable knights list than towards the bottom.

"Magic." She answers, tempted to leave it at that but no, she's proud of what it was supposed to be.

"Twenty-six seals placed on the world, and activated." She pauses. "They didn't work like we thought they would."

"Could you try it again? What went wrong?"

There's this tiny flicker of hope in his voice. If the world is meant to die, then it should, but if he can give his grandchildren a world to live in without the wizard, then he'd like that very much. Or well. Without the Protector, he supposes, based on what she said.

More importantly, he wants to help if there's a chance of that.

Unfortunately for Gyre and his family, that's not an option. There's a lot to it, but she's only going to give him the information that's important.

"The world didn't stabilize, it changed the seals into something else. They can't do what we made them to do anymore." She lets a hand drift to the side, manifesting a mug with hot chocolate and a long, bendy straw that makes it up beneath her hat and to her mouth.

"We had to adapt to what we were given."

Well that information isn't enough for him. His thoughts spin for a moment, considering her words. She sounds like this world is still alive? But she said it was destroyed right? Or maybe she's talking about his world? He's so confused, shaking his head.

"What were you given? What happened to the seals?"

"A mess" She doesn't give him much more in the way of details than she had previously. But she can at least give him more of the truth.

"We get a year at a time. The world spins on in single year chunks."

He grumbles at her refusal to answer, squinting in her direction. If she just answered questions, she'd make things easier for herself honestly. He at least takes in her words, chewing his lip for a moment.

"Here? Yeah, I know. What happened to the other worlds though?" He taps this foreign tree she'd called her friend earlier. "Like this one. What'd you do to save this one?

If he keeps up his curiosity, he'll likely get all the answers he could ever want. He just has to ask.

"Fractured. The center wanted out, the outside wasn't strong enough to stop it." She gives a little more detail into how she'd described it before. That world had been incredible to watch perish.

He does not know how to process her words honestly. It doesn't match up to anything he knows about any world, but he just tucks it away for now.

"How did you try to save it?" he repeats. "Is it the same here? The inside wants to... escape?"

Cute. She would elaborate if he asked her to, but he doesn't know that.

"No." They aren't the same at all. "This world is filled with something much worse, something alive."

"Something...? What is it?"

Is the world an egg?? He has no context for what could live inside a planet and he actually sounds awed as he asks.

"You could call it magic." She answers, back to vague answers. Or is her answer vague because she doesn't know? Or does she know but not have a word for what it is? Or is she sparing Gyre the details he doesn't need? Either way, her now-empty mug makes the straw-sucking-at-nothing sound and disappears a moment later, followed by the straw.

"It might be sentient."

He has no patience for cryptic bullshit, and she's officially pushed him past his limit. He sighs, clearly sounding a little frustrated.

"What does that mean? You're so vague."

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